Stephen Colbert touts sister's congressional bid

Stephen Colbert has used his late night comedy to show to tout his sister's
run for Congress in their native South Carolina.

US comedian Stephen ColbertPhoto: REUTERS

7:00AM GMT 08 Feb 2013

Elizabeth Colbert-Busch, the comic's elder sister, is running as a Democrat for a special election in a Republican district of Charleston.

Speaking on his Comedy Central show, Mr Colbert joked that she would not receive any "free airtime" on his programme.

"As a broadcast journalist, I am obligated to maintain pure objectivity. It doesn’t matter that my sister is intelligent, hardworking, compassionate and dedicated to the people of South Carolina,” he said.

Mr Colbert, who's onscreen persona is a satirical conservative, said he was not "not sure I can support her because she's running as a Democrat".

The siblings are two out of 11 children in a large Catholic family and lost their father and two brothers in a plane crash in 1974.

She works as a business director at South Carolina's Clemson University and was reportedly at a conference across the street from the World Trade Centre on September 11, 2001.

Mr Colbert has often flirted with entering politics and his supporters urged South Carolina's governor to appoint him to the US Senate when the state's former senator, Jim DeMint, stepped down.

She declined, instead picking a local congressman and triggering the special election which is due to take place on May 7.

Assuming she wins the Democratic primary, Mrs Colbert-Busch faces an uphill battle in a district that voted around 60 per cent Republican in the presidential election.

Among her potential Republican contenders is Mark Sanford, the former South Carolina governor who resigned in disgrace after it emerged that he had flown to Argentina to see his mistress while telling aides he was hiking.